FIONA PHILLIPS has interviewed some of the biggest names in politics and showbiz. Three mornings a week, she gets up at 4am to make the short trawl to work to sit on the GMTV Today sofa.

So she's no stranger to pressure or working off the cuff.

For the past 10 years, this terrier-like but utterly personable presenter has helped wake up six million of us during her early morning shifts in the hot seat.

She is cool under pressure and nothing, it seems, appears to phase her.

Until now that is.

Because for the first time in a long while, the presenter is out of her comfort zone.

She is in a quandary, and it's over her first book.

Which isn't her book. But it is. But it really isn't, as she didn't write it. Yet her name is on the cover. And then if she said she's written it, wouldn't she be called a liar?

But it IS her book. And her Welsh publisher Accent has already sold 9,000 advance copies.

Yet it isn't her work.

So what's a girl to do?

'Oh god,' sighs 46-year-old Phillips from the GMTV studios.

'I don't want to lie and say I wrote it, which I didn't, but my name's on it, and they [her agent and publishers] want me to help publicise it.

'But how can I talk about it when I didn't do it? Am I supposed to say I didn't do it?

'But I didn't do it but my name's on it like I did do it. Oh god...'

The girl's confused. Hilariously so, in fact.

Instead of the poised, composed, confident, feisty personality we're used to seeing in the mornings, the 'author' - my calling her that brings out yet another exasperated sigh - simply doesn't know how to get around the ghost writer 'thing'.

So let's clarify then.

Did you, or did you not, actually write the book?

'Um, er, well no. Oh dear...'

OK. Were you involved?

'Well, yes, a bit.'

How? 'I saw the final manuscript.'

And? 'And I saw it. And I liked it. And I thought it was a great book.'

Go on. 'And then they convinced me to put my name to it. Oh god, what will people think of me? And they want me to do a book signing in Haverfordwest (where her late Welsh-speaking mum Amy was from, and her relatives remain) and go on [ITV1 daytime show] Loose Women to talk about it. What am I going to do?'

You would think she'd committed the ultimate sin, but putting her name to something she didn't really write obviously sits uncomfortably with her.

Yet, in a more comfortable irony, Phillips was eager to get involved in a project that gets people reading.

The book, A Day To Remember, is part of the Quick Reads scheme - entertaining, fast-paced books designed to help adults develop a love of reading.

Fast is right. It took me less than an hour to whiz through the 86 pages of Fiona's (almost) literary debut.

It's this easy-reading quality that eventually persuaded Phillips to put her name to the book.

Because reading, she says, is her 'best, most favourite thing to do'.

'I'm always telling my son [Nat] to read more but he's so reluctant to read.

'But I honestly think that if you can read, you can do anything. So I keep putting books in front of his face!

'Even if you have a bad education, reading can get you through and open up doors which may have been closed to you because of your schooling. That's what happened to me.'

A heartbeat later she adds, 'Oh I know, can you concentrate on that? You know, on the real reason why I've put my name to it? It's because I love books and reading helped me even though I went to a c*** school.

'Yeah, let's make this about reading being a passion of mine.'

Although her own state education left a lot to be desired - she left secondary school in Southampton aged 16 with only one O-level - she felt it served as a good foundation for life in the outside world.

She perviously stated that she was a 'hateful' teenager who had smoked from the age of 11 and went on regular shoplifting raids, one of which resulted in her ashen-faced parents having to collect her from a police cell.

She joined a gang of bullies and had spent most of her time outside the classroom for bad behaviour and getting into fights, just to fit in.

But she overcame her early setbacks by going on to sixth form college, retaking her O-levels, sitting three A-levels and gaining a place at university.

'It's down to reading,' says Phillips, who is also mum to four-year-old Mackenzie and married to GMTV Today's editor Martin Frizell.

'My parents, particularly my dad Phil, was always pushing books in front of me when I was growing up.

'So although my school wasn't great, books gave me a level of intelligence that opened doors eventually.

'Dad put books in front of me from very young age.

'I used to be miffed, though, as my friends used to have nice girly books and magazines like Bunty and Twinkle and I was there with my blooming Look and Learn books! My heart used to sink.

'But it's that kind of exposure to literature, any kind of reading, which I fell in love with - I'd even read the back of a cereal packet, me.

'Reading's the key to everything. If you can do that, there's nothing you can't do.'

A Day To Remember is a short, snappy, chick-lit comedy about love, loyalty and limos.

Written - let's be honest here - by Lynne Barrett-Lee, one of Wales' best selling authors, it's an easy read, a quick story that's more substantial than a magazine short but less meaty than a 200,000-word tome.

And that's what Phillips adores about it. She says, 'The book isn't pretending to be something it isn't. It really is a quick read.

'It's a little book. I read it really quickly and wanted to know what happened to Jo, the heroine, in the end.

'I really couldn't put it down and I'm not saying that just because I'm involved in it.

'It isn't a big book full of flowery prose; it's just a nice book with a nice, easy-to-read story. It won't be a big daunting read for people who can't read or who aren't really into books, but neither is it insubstantial.

'When I got the final manuscript through I just sped through it as it's a charming story and Lynne's a great writer.

'Honest, it's a great way to start to get into reading.'

As for Lynne, ghost writing wasn't without its own set of challenges.

'When I was first asked to ghost write a new Quick Reads title my initial reaction was to say no - a knee-jerk response caused by having such an enormous ego.

'If I was going to write something I wanted my name on the jacket - and the plaudits! But it didn't take me long to change my mind.

'After all, the timeframe was tight and I was able to do it relatively speedily because I'd already written a Quick Read, which is a very specific type of writing.

'I also had a great deal of respect for Fiona Phillips and I figured - if it's not too presumptuous, given that we've never actually met! - that given the similarity of our ages, family situations, personalities and so on I could write something she might herself have written.

'The most important factor though was that I, like Fiona, think the Quick Reads initiative is great, and needs supporting - not just from the point of view of a writer who wants more readers, but also because there's been so little out there for people who are lacking in reading confidence and so are intimidated by the idea of a full-length work.'

She added, 'People are much more likely to notice the books if they have familiar names on the cover, aren't they?

'The important thing is that the book does the project justice and that people come to enjoy reading as a consequence of having read a Quick Read.'

With her 'debut' now in the shops, there is still the question of whether Phillips will actually write a book one day - you know, on her own, with her name sitting happily on the front.

'Oh yes, definitely. I can say I'm one of those people who thinks they have a book in them.

'In fact there's stuff on my computer now and stuff with a publisher.

'It isn't a novel though - but I can't talk about it!'

So when can we expect to see it?

'I don't know. I'm still enjoying what I do, but I'd like to have more time to write.'

Until then, until she sets aside time to focus on that all-important second book - oops, sorry, first - she'll have to content herself with seeing A Day To Remember on bookshelves in shops around the UK. And live with the fact that people will think she wrote it.

'Will it be that bad? You know, people thinking I wrote it when I didn't?'

I remind her that she put her name to the work for all the right reasons, a little piece of logic that seems to placate her for a moment.

'I mean, loads of people put their names to other people's books, don't they?

'I can't do that and I'm not going to lie about it. My reasons for putting my name to it were for all the right reasons, weren't they? Oh god.... what do you think?

'I love reading. I really, really do. I'm passionate about it. I just finished a great biography on Thomas Hardy that my husband bought me for Christmas. Do you think saying I love Hardy and Sebastian Foulkes that people will think I'm up myself?

'Oh blooming heck, I love Hardy and Foulkes. And I love A Day To Remember! Oh god....'